From November 12-18, San Francisco hosted Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation, a gathering of delegates from 21 Pacific Nations in negotiations on trade, investment, and general economic issues.
The conference, according to the US state department, resulted in advances in international connection, building enterprise, and over $50 billion in investments by US companies. The state department claims a significant investment in US companies by APEC partner economies as a knock-on effect of the conference and its surrounding talks.
Partnered with a meeting of some of the most wealthy and influential CEOs in the modern world, the conference was perhaps the largest gathering of power, both political and economic, in recent history.
The illustrious guest list included names such as Presidents Joe Biden, Xi Jinping, and Justin Trudeau, along with CEOs Marc Benioff of Salesforce, OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Microsoft’s Satya Nadella.
The gathering of so many members of the highest classes of society, among a variety of global controversies, led to expectations of abounding protests.
Most notably, on Nov. 15, the date of a large gathering of APEC leaders on the Embarcadero, was met with multiple protests around the city and at its gates.
“We’re here tonight because Joe Biden is supposed to be in town, and we believe with one phone call he can shut it (the conflict in Gaza) down,” Margerie Michaels, a protester near the meeting’s gate stated.
Directly outside the gathering, a sizable group braved the rain, facing down well equipped police guards in anticipation of President Biden’s arrival, chanting slogans in protest of the US’ support of Israel in the recent Gaza Strip conflict.
“Presedent Biden is strongly supporting genocide,” George Marx, an activist for social justice, stated.
Short of occasional small scale arrests, protests continued throughout the conference without major incident, somewhat to the surprise of some organizers.
“The protests seemed very underwhelming as compared to what was expected by the APEC conference leaders I was working with,” Lupe Cope, a security volunteer at APEC remarked on the matter.
With its conclusion on Nov. 18, the APEC conference ended with success in its organizers goals, met with relatively docile public resistance.
